With demand for air travel continuing to decline, primarily due to the SARS virus, Singapore Airlines (SIA) today announced further frequency reductions, bringing its total capacity cuts in April and May 2003 to 28.9 per cent in terms of available seat kilometres.

This latest round of cuts, which affects services in all regions but especially North and South East Asia, will result in up to 298 fewer weekly frequencies during the month of May. Services to five destinations that were previously suspended until 31 May have now been terminated: Chicago, Las Vegas, Kaohsiung, Hiroshima and Mauritius.

Services to Fukuoka and Jeddah will be temporarily suspended from 8 May and 15 May respectively.

The launch of services to Bangalore, initially planned for 1 May and later deferred until 12 June, has again been deferred, with no new date decided at this stage.

The attached table shows the original number of frequencies to the affected destinations (in accordance with published schedules for Northern Summer) and the revised number, after deducting those that have been cut during the month of May.

Since it shows that SQ is cutting the LAX flights in half, which flight
is being cancelled. The one from SIN/NRT or SIN/TPE????
That is a big change as they have been double daily to LAX for
at least the last 10 years...

SQ029 departs Los Angeles on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 0120, arriving at 1130 the next day in Singapore. (MEGATOP)
SQ011 departs Los Angeles on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays at 1450, arriving at 0110 two days later in Singapore. (MEGATOP).

Unfortunately, there are no services with Singapore Airlines Limited between Los Angeles and Singapore on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

Singapore Airlines SQ0319 and SQ0318 to and from London Heathrow to Singapore respectively will no longer operate on Tuesdays and Wednesdays (MEGATOP).

Singapore Airlines SQ0175 and SQ0176 to and from Hanoi Noi Bai to Singapore respectively will no longer operate on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays (JUBILEE) (Presumably JUBILEE ER).

Singapore Airlines SQ0231 and SQ0232 to and from Sydney to Singapore respectively will no longer operate. (JUBILEE 300) Sydney continues to be served by morning and evening departures from Singapore and afternoon and mid-afternoon departures from Sydney (MEGATOP)

Singapore Airlines SQ0215 and SQ0216 to and from Perth to Singapore respectively will no longer operate on Tuesdays, Thrusdays and Saturdays and Wednesdays and Fridays respectively. (JUBILEE) (Indication towards a JUBILEE ER)

Singapore Airlines SQ0859 and SQ0860 to and from Hong Kong to Singapore will be the only flight operating from Hong Kong daily departing Hong Kong at 0930 and arriving at 1215 in Singapore and departing Singapore at 1330 and arriving at 1705 in Hong Kong. (JUBILEE 300) (Previously the destination was served by JUBILEE 200 aircraft)

I heard pre-SARS that MI was evaluating KHH again, but don't expect anything to happen for some time. SQ/MI have had such a chequered history with this station I wonder why they even bother anymore.

Cx_flyboy:
I think the Temasek Group owns 57% of SIA. I don't know how much cash is on hand, I guess we'll find out when they release their FY02/03 results - this is usually done sometime in May. As for whether the government will bail them out, that remains anybody's guess. I would think loan guarantees are a definite, beyond that it is hard to tell. The government has been trying to encourage government-linked companies to function more like private enterprises, with mixed results. I don't know if they'll reverse this policy in crisis situations like this.

"Twelve cabin crew on a returning Singapore Airlines flight from Hong Kong have been served Home Quarantine Orders by the Health Ministry.
An SIA spokesman said this was because a passenger onboard flight SQ859 might have been suffering from SARS."

"Two airline passengers have been picked up as SARS-suspect cases through thermal scanning at Changi Airport. Both have been admitted to Tan Tock Seng Hospital. The Health Ministry said the first air traveller, who lives in Hong Kong, had arrived on Singapore Airlines flight SQ859 on April 27 at 5.00 pm."

Let's look at the Las Vegas Sun and how it has reported (in honesty and truth) about the SIA flights and what information SIA has given.

20 January 2003:
"James Boyd, a spokesman for Singapore Airlines in Los Angeles, said the Las Vegas flight continues to perform well for the carrier. He said ticket sales in Asia have been strong, but that the company is trying to increase sales of tickets in Southern Nevada.

"We came off a really strong high season," Boyd said. "The challenge for us has been to encourage Las Vegans to travel to Southeast Asia and that continues to be one of our big pushes."

28 January 2003:
"They (Singapore) would not announce something like this unless they had a pretty good indication that the Asian economy is going to come back," Boyd said. "It's great for Las Vegas if (the airline) sees a rebound in Asian traffic."

(James Boyd is the Manager of U.S.A. operations)

19 March 2003:
Singapore Airlines, which introduced nonstop service between Hong Kong and Las Vegas last summer, has no plans for service reductions, but spokesman James Boyd said the situation is being closely monitored.

James Boyd said the airline already has begun attempting to form new alliances with Strip properties for package deals that would encourage tourism from Southeast Asia. He said the pre-emptive move is not an indication that demand is weak, although Asian tourists traditionally have shown the most caution about traveling in times of turmoil.

20 March 2003 (one day later):
Singapore Airlines, which inaugurated nonstop service between Las Vegas and Hong Kong last summer, will suspend its twice-a-week flights for two months beginning in April because of low demand anticipated with the outbreak of war in Iraq.

"We're disappointed," said Rob Powers, a spokesman for LVCVA. "This pretty much caught us by surprise. We're confident it will be a temporary situation because the partnership between Las Vegas and Singapore Airlines is a good one and will continue to work. It came as a complete surprise to us," said Grey.

Singapore spokesman James Boyd said the airline's current plan is to suspend the flights from April 7 through May 31. That means the last nonstop flight from Hong Kong would arrive in Las Vegas April 7 because of the schedule. Boyd said that plan could change, depending on what occurs in Iraq.
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I was always wondering why certain Asian flights have not been "passed on to" MI, such as KHH, BKI, KCH, PEN, SUB ... maybe as codeshare or "operated by" deals

While a lot of regional flights could be operated more profitably by MI, there are various reasons why SQ has held on to them.

Some flights are strategically important to SQ. PEN would be an example - SIA had to fight hard and long to win rights to PEN, and to not operate those flights with SQ metal could potentially weaken SQ's position in future bilateral ASA negotiations.

SQ guards it brand identity jealously. While MI's service levels are high, it isn't SQ - no PTVs, less frills, and dare I say it - less attractive female FAs. SQ will not want too many flights to be passed on to MI for that reason, nor will they place their codes on MI flights.

MI does not operate widebodies. A big factor in SE Asia where size, apparently, does matter MI tried operating A310s for a while - huge disaster! They won't be in a hurry to operate another widebody for a long time.

MI is not a member of the Star Alliance - they only accept SQ's KrisFlyer. They have assessed that it isn't worth it to join Star. Handing over key routes with high business traffic (SUB, SGN, HAN, etc) would cause non-Asian based frequent flyers to avoid both SQ and MI if they can find an alternative to their destination that will yield FF miles all the way.

S-Air: I would not put too much credence on James Boyd's statements. And he is not the Manager of SIA operations - he is the PR person. Yes, the same one who announced prematurely that there were no known fatalities on SQ6.